The Match

The thing about football is that it is not an elite sport, no matter what Sky and BT Sports may try to tell you. The vast majority of players do it for fun - they pay their £5 a match fee (or whatever it might be nowadays - it was 50p in my day), enjoy the game, then go to the bar for a beer with the opposition. Crowds are usually one man and his dog - if that. Clubs are not multi-billion pound enterprises, but run by volunteers on a hand-to-mouth basis. It's a scene I know well, having spent my entire playing days in such clubs. The Match is an homage to everyone involved in grass-roots football, in whatever league, in whatever country. Without us, mega-bucks footie simply would not exist.

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It's 1975.

The Wanderers F.C. are playing their final match of a hard season, at home to their local rivals Enderby Town. They must win to secure their first local league title, and Town need only a point for the same prize. Coincidentally, the day coincides with Wanderers' end of season barbecue, disco and prize giving party. Will they be celebrating a championship or licking their wounds?

Follow a list of characters, their wives and girlfiends from both clubs, through the events of the day - the preparations that go into the contest, the bedroom antics and hard drinking - and resulting violence - of ordinary young men more interested in pleasure than making a fortune from the game they love.

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​There are also the older men, trying to control an increasingly unruly younger generation and prevent a memorable day descending into a bloodbath, couples whose dreams are realised or shattered by the events of the day. And in the background, the soundtrack to a generation.

Anyone who has experienced the game at this level will have similar memories and seen events and action like that described in The Match.

UPDATE: Well the first draft is complete and an initial edit well under way. It will be completed by the end of this month, so I'm now looking at the mechanics of publishing the book......there are so many options out there! If anyone has any advice or recommendations, I would welcome your input. You can get in touch through the Contact Me page on here.

UPDATE: It's been a difficult few months, I have to say, largely spent desperately searching for meaningful (and well paid) employment, so writing has of necessty taken a back seat. So the revision is still sadly not completed, and another year has passed without this beast seeing the light of day. I'm back on track now, job search successfully completed, and I'm hoping that the adrenalin rush of a new job in an old location (and what's more promising stability for several months) will get me back into Creative Mode rather than Panic Mode and get me working again, in those quiet hotel evenings.

Watch this space..........

Luxembourg, September 18 2017

UPDATE Finally, the website jumps back to life, because finally something is actually happening.

Since the last UPDATE in September last year, I have not been idle. I completed second and third revisions of The Match, and was finally satisfied. Time to do something serious. A couple

of years ago, I read an article on the BBC News website about self-publishing and saved it for a rainy day. The rainy day duly arrived and I contacted one of the specialists (I picked one at

random) who was interviewed for the article. Within half an hour I received a positive response, and sent off a PDF of the book for him to read . Since then - May this year - we have been

corresponding back and forth, and the guy is helping me take the idea forward. I will write something in more detail soon, as we are still discussing terms, but right now I anticipate

The Match hitting a bookshop or e-reader near you sometiime towards the end of March 2019, to coincide with my birthday - publication is my gift to myself.

There's a lot still to do, not least having it professionally edited, coming up with a decent and eye-catching cover design, and organising some effective publicity and advertising (where

does a new author start with stuff like that? All will be revealed!)..........and lots more besides. But I WILL get there. Annd when I do a lifelong ambition will be realized.